


in these bodies we will die

by QuickSilverFox3



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Established Relationship, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Keldabe Kiss, M/M, Multi, Post-Order 66 (Star Wars), Purge Trooper CC-2224 | Cody
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-25 03:28:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30082791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuickSilverFox3/pseuds/QuickSilverFox3
Summary: “Trying for a saber of your own?” Ninth Sister spat one day as she stormed from the throne room, her anger rolling from her like lightning and breaking harmlessly on the impassive countenance of CC-2224. “Trying to be a Brother, clone?”“I’m already a brother,” CC-2224 tells her, but he doesn’t know why.-Cody knows something is going to go wrong when he wakes up on a mission to execute a Jedi. But that is also just a matter of perspective.
Relationships: CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi, CC-2224 | Cody/Obi-Wan Kenobi/Quinlan Vos, CC-2224 | Cody/Quinlan Vos, Obi-Wan Kenobi/Quinlan Vos
Comments: 3
Kudos: 55





	in these bodies we will die

**Author's Note:**

> Commander Cody Week Day 04: Post-Order 66

Most days, the trooper wakes up and finds that he is still CC-2224. The world around him is sharp and dark: the purple crackle of his electrostaff mingling with the steady beat of his heart which remained as rhythmic as a march, until it blotted out everything else. He is nothing but a weapon, and he waits patiently for his orders, whatever they may be. 

On those days, he knows his place in the durasteel universe, following his Lord and enacting his will. The sneers — openly worn and honed to a razor’s edge — from the Brothers and Sisters that made up the Inquisitors didn’t impact him in the way they were hoping, because why would they? He is a weapon, one of a few who had been gifted beskar by their Lord, and who served at his convenience. 

“Trying for a saber of your own?” Ninth Sister spat one day as she stormed from the throne room, her anger rolling from her like lightning and breaking harmlessly on the impassive countenance of CC-2224. “Trying to be a Brother, clone?”

“I’m already a brother,” CC-2224 tells her, but he doesn’t know why. She turns on her heel and leaves in a swish of black fabric, and he returns to waiting for his next order. He listens to the rumbling breaths from Darth Vader, the slight mechanical click between each hissing exhalation adding to the reflexive count in his head. 

When Cody wakes on the transport, he knows that something has gone horribly wrong.

The floor shuddered beneath his feet with each roar of the massive engines, but the room is eerily silent. Before… Before when he was— Cody cut the thought off before it could travel any further. His mind felt fragile, as if it was constructed from freshly spun glass, and he knew that if it broke, he didn’t know how long it would be before he was able to pull control back again. Or even if he would want to.

Bile rose in his throat, hot and thick and acrid, and his shoulders contorted with the effort of keeping the scream trapped in his throat. He had woken up as Cody before but never prior to a mission. Never held the ability to escape, or to die, as closely as he did now. 

He could remember, beneath the dark edges of the Executor and the constant  _ hiss-click  _ sound of the man who had once been Anakin Skywalker, a single moment of clarity as he knelt in front of the shell that hid his rotted carcass. Cody had been holding a lightsaber, the edges of it scorched and warped, and the scent of iron lingered in the air from the blue blood that had seeped into the handle. For a moment, his thumb had twitched over the ignition switch that could have been his salvation or his doom, but then Cody was gone once again as Darth Vader raised his chin with one gloved finger. 

“ _ Well done, Commander _ .  _ I am glad to see I chose correctly. _ ”

Cody had to hold on. Eyes squeezed tightly shut, he blindly ran a hand over the wall, fingers splayed until he found the recess, pulling the datapad free. 

For an instant, before the screen activated, Cody caught sight of his reflection in the tinted transparisteel and felt the world threaten to fall away from him once more, nothing but the void waiting to consume him utterly. 

What had Anakin done?

Obi-Wan —  _ traitor to the Republic, good soldiers follow orders, no!  _ — hadn’t spoken about Anakin’s past, but a trooper would have had to be blind to not see the marks that his past had left on him, the anger that burnt low in his eyes and caused his mouth to twist whenever someone mentioned the troopers being owned. Cody had seen the scar on Anakin’s arm from his tracker removal, straight and well-healed compared to the now-ruined tapestry of scars that had covered his back. 

Cody’s fingers didn’t tremble as he raised his hand to his face, trailing a line from scalp to chin. He couldn’t feel anything different, a few new minor scars here and there pitting his skin like the surface of a moon, a far cry from the whorled raised scar that curled around his left eye. But that didn’t subtract from the new knowledge he carried: that Anakin had branded him like property with a red tattoo that would mar his skin forever. 

Focus.

Breathe in, then out.

_ (I am one with the Force, and the Force is with me.) _

Cody focused on the datapad, reading over the minimal briefing he had been given, doom slipping over his shoulders like a shroud. He had been sent to hunt a Jedi, to track the whispers of a survivor and kill them. 

Laughter, harsh and uncaring, bubbled up in his throat, trapped behind the cage of his teeth. What was one more when Cody had killed one of the men he loved with barely a second thought?

⁂

Cody felt himself slip partially beneath the waves of his consciousness the moment the trooper stepped outside the ship, hiding away from the first flicker of unspeakable terror that passed over a civilian's face at the sight of him. 

The CC-2224 knew the motions, just as well as Cody did. Alpha-17 had vanished into the wind, from what little he had managed to find out from scraps of rumors, but he remembered his, and the other trainers, words well. 

Move quick, strike hard, complete the mission. 

Salt clung to every visible structure, encrusted pillars that distorted the shapes of the shipping crates and barrels into hunched figures as CC-2224 stepped into the warehouse. His electroshock baton lit up with a hiss, bathing the room in a vibrant purple, and the trooper took a step forward. The floor crunched beneath his boot, grinding down the patchwork of salt as he slowly followed the faint trail of footprints, head tilted to one side as he listened. 

The Jedi —  _ the traitor, no, all of them, traitors _ — was cornered with nowhere to run and had never been more dangerous.

He saw the flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye, and he is turning before the trooper can even think, but it is Cody who shouts, his voice tinged with a desperation that could have ripped the stars from the sky at a word. “ _ Quinlan _ !”

The man stumbled, caught off guard for only a moment, before he turned, igniting his lightsaber. The green blade stole Cody’s breath away, Quinlan’s lips drawn back in a snarl as he shifted into the beginning position of Ataru, the muscles in his legs visibly bunching as he prepared to jump.

Cody knew what he would do. He had seen it so many times before; a deadly dance made beautiful by the care and precision behind it: a single leap and twist, with the blade following barely half a second behind, leaving nothing but death in its wake. 

His helmet clattered to the ground, the air biting at the tears that rolled down his cheeks. Then, the hiss of Quinlan’s blade stopped as the Jedi deignited it, stumbling forward half a step before he caught himself, hurt emblazoned across his face.

Cody was struck by how different he seemed now to their last parting. Before, where Obi-Wan had been the rising sun and Cody was moonlight, Quinlan was the midday sun, bright and vibrant and intoxicating. He had curled into Cody’s side, one leg thrown across his hip to prod at Obi-Wan, who was motionless, except for the faint rise and fall of his chest. His breath still held the sweetness of the wine from the previous evening, part celebration and part regret at having to be parted once more even as the war slowly drew to a close.

Extracting himself was a journey in parts as Quinlan slowly worked his way free, every movement languid and tinged with a deep melancholy. 

“You don’t have to get up with me,” he whispered, cupping Cody’s face with one battle-worn hand, his thumb smoothing over the jut of his cheekbone. Quinlan’s eyes slipped out of focus for a moment, warm brown no longer studying every inch of Cody’s face, but between one blink and the next, a warm grin spilled across his face. “But it is good to see you both.”

“It’s good to see you too,” Cody replied. It felt like a paltry offering compared to the roaring fire that rekindled itself in his chest for sustenance at the mere thought of the other men, but Quinlan only laughed, low and deep, before kissing him again.

“When the war is over—“ Quinlan cut off Cody’s attempt at protest with another kiss, infuriating and effective all at the same time before he continued, intent on daring the universe to defy him. “When the war is over, we will be together again.”

Cody tasted the promise like caff on his tongue, hoping with every shattered piece of him that Quinlan was right. His hands were steady as he untied the small token — a nondescript twist of metal with the edges worn smooth through the Force — from the leather tie around his neck, and pressed it into Quinlan’s hands. 

The man stepped backwards, a chill settling in the space between them, and closed his eyes. Cody settled back into the warmth of Obi-Wan’s embrace, watching the peace settle across Quinlan’s face, the edges of his grin softening. 

“Beautiful.”

“How?” Quinlan demanded, his voice harsh and broken, ripping Cody from the memory. “Why?” 

Cody’s hands spasmed around the handle of the electro baton, the urge to ignite it almost overwhelming. Quinlan was close, too close.

“Didn’t— Couldn’t—“ The words would choke him before he could speak. His free hand shook as he raised it, signing a single clumsy message as he trembled with the effort. 

He still tried to flinch away from the blow that Quinlan landed, the heavy hilt of his lightsaber thinking against his temple, then Cody was gone once again. 

When he woke, it could have hours, days, weeks, years later. But he was Cody, settling into the body it felt like he had borrowed, with a slight shift of his shoulders as he tested the restraints. 

He knew that he was on a ship, could feel the floor vibrating beneath him through the thin padding of the cot he was lying in. His stomach twisted and rolled as the autopilot shuddered into life, and then there was nothing to do but wait.

Pain pulsed through his head like a second heartbeat, blurring his vision when his eyes slipped open in coordination with the door. 

“Morning, Cody. Have I ever mentioned how blood-soaked is a very attractive look on you?”

“That makes three times now.” The words clawed up his throat as he spoke, dried blood flaking from his face with every movement. “And you were even stone-cold sober for one of them.”

“Such a liar,” Quinlan teased, his laugh choked and distorted by the tears that ran down his cheeks. The soft sound of metal clinking together followed him as he walked across the room, and Cody caught sight of the countless mementos strung across his chest on a sturdy chain.

“I can’t untie you,” Quinlan said, his voice heavy with regret as he sat on the edge of the bed. “After the first time, when you woke up and you weren’t you—“ He broke off with a grimace, the action mirrored by Cody.

He could barely breathe, regret and hope he thought he had killed long ago wrapping around his throat like a noose. “Are you okay?”

Quinlan laughed, the sound a distant echo from the rich timbre Cody remembered, leaning forward to press their foreheads together in Keldabe. “I’m fine, don’t worry about me. I’m notoriously hard to kill, which I guess is lucky for us both.”

As if sensing the dark direction Cody’s thoughts were starting to spiral in, Quinlan moved closer and kissed him gently, blotting out the universe for everything but soft warmth and the bite of salt and iron.

“I know about the chip. I can’t destroy it, cyar’ika.” 

Sorrow ripped through Cody’s chest like a blaster bolt. The memory of teaching Quinlan ‘ _ cyar’ika _ ’ each mumbled repetition punctuated with a kiss until it seemed to fill his very soul couldn’t stand against it, and Cody pulled away from the Jedi, curling in on himself as much as he could.

“I’ll hurt you. Eventually, I’ll slip back under, and I’ll kill you. Please, Quin.”

Quinlan shook his head, his jaw set in sly determination. “I can’t remove it. It’s too Dark for me to distinguish it from myself. But I know someone who can.

“You’re not a killer in the way you think you are, Cody. Obi-Wan is still alive. And he’s going to be so happy to see you.”

“Alive?” Cody felt as if the floor had fallen away beneath him, but he was still here, still in control. “He’s alive?”

Quinlan nodded, and Cody finally allowed himself to weep, pressing his face into the crook of Quinlan’s neck as the other man hugged him tightly, trying to hold his shattered pieces together for a while longer.


End file.
